The Federal Government on Friday, June 4, suspended indefinitely the operations of the microblogging application, Twitter in Nigeria. The suspension followed the deletion of President Muhammadu Buhari\u2019s tweet, which Twitter described as violating its rules. Several Nigerians had complained to Twitter that Buhari\u2019s tweet, which threatened to deal with a certain group of Nigerians \u201cin a language that they understand\u201d was offensive as it evokes unpleasant memories of Nigeria\u2019s civil war fought between 1967 and 1970, which led to the killing of more than 3 million Igbos. The civil war regarded by several Igbos as genocidal continues to hold traumatic memories for all Igbos. The complains described President Buhari\u2019s tweet as insensitive and Representative of the marginalisation and exclusion of Igbos by the Buhari government since it was first elected into office in 2015. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
In announcing the indefinite suspension of Twitter\u2019s\noperations in Nigeria, Information and Culture Minister, Lai Mohammed, stated the\nuse of the platform for activities \u201ccapable of undermining Nigeria\u2019s corporate\nexistence\u201d as reason for the decision. Furthermore,\nthe Minister directed the National Broadcasting Commission (NBC) to licence social\nmedia operators in Nigeria, henceforth. The NBC on its part, subsequently\nissued a statement on Monday, June 7, directing all broadcasting stations in Nigeria to\nde-install their Twitter handles and desist from using the platform for\ninformation gathering. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
The issue took a more bizarre turn, when the Minister of Justice and Attorney General of the Federation,\nAbubakar Malami, asked the Director of Public Prosecution to arrest and\nprosecute any person found using Twitter, in defiance to the ban. Legal experts\nhave countered this directive on the basis that there is no defined offence,\nwith a prescribed punishment that can be used as a basis to prosecute\n\u2018offenders\u2019 of the ban. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
The\ngovernment\u2019s suspension of Twitter has provoked outrage nationally and\ninternationally. Nigerians have criticised the decision as unconstitutional and\nviolating section\n39 of the 1999 Nigerian Constitution, which provides for free expression and\nfreedom to hold opinions and to receive and impart ideas and information\nwithout interference. Several organisations in the country have publicly\ncondemned the government\u2019s action, including the Policy and Legal Advocacy\nCentre (PLAC), the Nigeria Civil Society Situation Room, Socio-Economic Rights\nand Accountability Project (SERAP), etc. SERAP has further followed up with\nfiling a case at the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) Court. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Internationally, the government\u2019s action has also\nsparked condemnation. In a joint statement by the five diplomatic missions of the\nUnited States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Ireland and the European Union, they\ncondemned the ban on Twitter. According\nto the statement, \u201cThe path to a more secure Nigeria lies in more, not\nless communication, to accompany the concerted efforts of Nigeria\u2019s citizens in\nfulsome dialogue toward unity, peace and prosperity<\/em>.\u201d In a meeting with the diplomatic missions that\nissued the statement, Minister of Foreign Affairs, Geoffery Onyeama said that\nthe indefinite ban on the operations of Twitter will only be lifted when\nNigerians begin to use the app responsibly. While the immediate reason for the\nban on Twitter\u2019s operating in Nigeria may be related to app\u2019s deletion of\nPresident Buhari\u2019s tweet, Nigerians are beginning to read even more sinister\npurposes, with speculations rife that the action may be prelude to a further\nclampdown on Nigerian\u2019s constitutionally protected fundamental human rights. <\/p>\n\n\n\n There are speculations that the President may have\nbeen advised by the Justice Minister to impose martial law in the country to\ntackle the insecurity challenge the country is undergoing. The Minister of\nJustice has however denied that this is the case. There are also additional\nconcerns about the long term motive for the clampdown on Twitter, including\nconcerns about the next general elections in 2023. Beyond the politics, is the\ndevastating economic consequence of the ban on Twitter for Nigeria, including\nthe incredible negative perception of Nigerians among investors from all over\nthe world. In addition, young persons and Nigerian businesses carrying out\neconomic activities on Twitter have an incredibly devastating impact on their\neconomic activities because of the ban. In a country where unemployment is at\nan astonishing height, the impact of the ban can best be imagined. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The Federal Government on Friday, June 4, suspended indefinitely the operations of the microblogging application, Twitter in Nigeria. The suspension followed the deletion of President Muhammadu Buhari\u2019s tweet, which Twitter described as violating its rules. Several Nigerians had complained to Twitter that Buhari\u2019s tweet, which threatened to deal with a certain group of Nigerians \u201cin […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2146,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[355],"class_list":["post-2144","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-nigerian-government-twitter-ban-sparks-outrage"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/placng.org\/Legist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2144","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/placng.org\/Legist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/placng.org\/Legist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/placng.org\/Legist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/placng.org\/Legist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2144"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/placng.org\/Legist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2144\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2151,"href":"https:\/\/placng.org\/Legist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2144\/revisions\/2151"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/placng.org\/Legist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2146"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/placng.org\/Legist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2144"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/placng.org\/Legist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2144"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/placng.org\/Legist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2144"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}